


Soulmates

by drelfina



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, Multi, sort of happy ending? Eventually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-21
Updated: 2014-05-21
Packaged: 2018-01-25 23:42:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1666802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drelfina/pseuds/drelfina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While everyone has a soulmate it doesn't mean everyone finds them. </p><p>Phil Coulson introduces Clint Barton to his soulmate - he'd never expected that, that something so good would happen to him, that'd he would have somethng GOOD. </p><p>So of course, this is Phil Coulson's fault.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Soulmates

**Author's Note:**

  * For [harcourt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/harcourt/gifts).



> So uh. Harcourt and I had been tumblring back and forth and then I had to write this. So sorry it's not as good as it might be!

If you went all the way back, it sort of started when Phil fished Clint out of the gutter. 

No. 

Well. Not all the way back there - but that's where Phil and Clint started. That's the first time they met each other. 

Clint had been drunk, bleeding, sure that there was no real place for him in the world when you just wanted to do the right thing and Coulson... 

Had just been looking for a quiet place for a drink after his mission gone shit. 

That night had ended with Coulson patching Clint up, rolling him into a hotel bed, and having his quiet drink in the middle of his bedroom floor, watching to make sure Clint didn't choke. 

When Clint was sober, he offered him a job. 

**** 

Clint and Phil worked well together; SHIELD was a place where people of unusual abilities could find a place of acceptance, and even if the work was long and hard, it was dificult to feel terribly alone there. 

Them falling into... something together wasn't that much of a surprise. 

"I dont think I'll ever find my soul-mate," Coulson said, mildly, showing Clint the runes twisting around his left arm. The only mark on Coulson's body - he hadn't even gotten the tattoo from the Marines that Clint was SURE that his entire company had (And Fury had, somewhere). 

The runes were unreadable - they matched no other language in the world, and Clint said, "huh, so your soulmate's an egyptian deadguy." 

Then Coulson had smacked hm and tried to pin him into the mats. 

"Really, though, means that you're not gonna run off just because a guy with your name on his arm walks down the room," Clint pointed out, and then leaned over to kiss him. 

Clint's own soulmate wouldn't want him anyway, not after everything he's done, and honestly Coulson accepting him was far more satisfying. 

*** 

Except Coulson was terrifyingly efficient. And apparently a self-sacrificial martyr. 

Or maybe it was because he'd given Coulson a heart attack that time he'd fallen off comms for two weeks and came back with the Black Widow, her own calf twisting with Cyrillic cursive.

But anyway while Clint was sitting up in Medical, after the medics had told him blandly that he was to sit there and take all his vaccinations like a good boy (They had claimed they'd updated the panel lately but he KNEW it was because Coulson was pissed at him and was punishing him with Medical bay. At least he got a lollipop), Coulson came in with a rugged handsome man. 

"Specialist," Coulson said, blandly, formally, and Clint came to attention because that was always a sign something big was going to happen. "This is Agent Rumlow." 

And then Clint just stared. 

Feeling the words burn on his skin, just behind his knee. 

Brock Rumlow. 

The man was staring too, and Coulson left, with a quiet I'll let you two get acquainted but Rumlow was already moving forward, hand reaching out to Clint's cheek and that was it. 

*** 

Having your soulmate was something out of this WORLD. Shield had a pretty high percent of their personnel with their soulmates - after all, if you knew everything why would't you use it to help matchmake? 

Maybe it was the knowledge of what it meant, that Rumlow was his second half, and Clint was - guilty of being neglectful. But the n Coulson had withdrawn too, smiling faintly and saying something about the honeymoon period. 

And maybe Coulson had something - he was always the better one at social nicieties after all - he and Coulson still worked brilliantly together, and spent so much time together in their small strike Team with Natasha, while Brock was a much better in a large group. Large as in a team of five, the backup, the one to take down a group in a quiet, swarming fashion, while Clint and Phil and Natasha were mayhem and destruction and information in and out. 

So it really wasn't a surprise to need to spend as much time outside of missions with Brock, when they were all always so busy. 

Coulson hadn't seemed to mind, when Clint promised, promised he'd find some time to spend with him, and Coulson'd just wave it off to say that he'd wait til lafter the honeymoon. 

Then the Chitauri happened. 

And Coulson died. 

*** 

The only one who had stood there with Clint during Phil's memorial service had been Brock - he'd not even wanted to have the man there, to be honest, he'd pushed Natasha away as well - but Brock had kept his hand on the back of his neck, leading Clint out and away from the memorial service to a small back room with live feed set up and just let him watch. 

Rumlow had said nothing about the way clint hadn't been able to cry, or mourn, just shake, the only thing grounding him to the here and now being Rumlow's warm grip at the back of his neck.

*** 

After, without Coulson, Clint had no more Strike Team delta. Natasha had always done well in small groups, and also did brilliantly on her own, So Clint was sometimes sent on a mission with Brock instead of just aerial cover for Nat. He and Brock didn't work that great together in a team, but no one said a word about it, since it was pretty much standard cafeteria gossip in Rumlow's team that Clint Barton was Brock Rumlow's mate. 

They had their own room anytime the team bunked somewhere, their bedrolls were always next to each other. 

In fact, Brock got more protective, during the times Clint was on his team, hovering next to him, touching him all the time and - that was the times Clint missed Coulson the MOST, because it was strange to have his soulmate and lover on the same team during work. 

Clint took his own solo missions though, and Clint was senior enough a specialist that Brock didn't protest it, though he clearly never was happy about him leaving on his own. 

He was just coming back from one when he heard that Fury had been attacked. possibly dead. 

it had been a shock - the man was Coulson's best friend, and Fury had been - had seemed - indestructable. 

Except... 

Except the air aroudn HQ was.. something. 

People were looking at him. He hadn't had time to find Natasha, hadn' t had time to talk to Steve, when they declared Steve - _Steve_ was the one who had taken him onto the avengers just becaue Natasha said so, Steve hadn't looked more than askance at him - an enemy of SHIELD and. 

There was something _wrong_. 

And he knew something was wrong even before Brock had walked in. 

"you have orders to capture _Captain America_?" 

Captain America had been Phil's Idol. _Steve_ had been nice enough, and he was Natasha's friend, as much as she could have one who wasn't what SHIELD was. 

Brock had just, cocked his head. "You don't want me to?" he said, lightly. 

But Brock had WORKED with Steve. So often. 

"You worked with the guy," Clint said. 

"It's nothing personal," Brock said, adjusting his shirt and then reaching up to cup Clint's jaw and then Clint saw it. 

It really was nothing personal. THere was something wrong; he'd thought Brock was Steve's friend maybe. 

Brock reacted before Clint had a chance to move , only because Brock was his soulmate, was his other half, he hadn't expected THAT and then Brock had Clint pinned up against the wall, choking him. 

"This, now, this is personal," Brock said, and he DID sound regretful. "I can't let you get hurt, Clint." 

Then a needle. 

**** 

Clint learnt Brock's betrayal by watching it happen on TV in the safehouse. No, the jail he'd been locked into. It was a holding house for the more dangerous of agents, and without the fingerprint of the authorising agent, Clint was getting nowhere. 

The betrayal burned; because it wasn't just betraying him and Steve. It was worse than that. It wasn't even just betraying Fury - 

it was tearing down SHIELD. 

And SHIELD was everything to Clint, the place that had saved him, given him a greater cause to work for. 

and now it was all gone. 

*** 

When Rumlow died, Clint felt the tearing, vicious pain, like he was having his heart burned out. 

It was the opposite feeling of having his heart and mind iceed over, and well. 

Clint hoped that oblivion would soon take over.

**Author's Note:**

> ........... it doesn't have an explicit ending, but Phil coulson's alive, and he'll come for Clint eventually? 
> 
> Yes?


End file.
